40 pages • 1 hour read
Douglas Stone, Sheila Heen, Bruce PattonDifficult Conversations: How to Discuss What Matters Most
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1999A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Key Figures
Douglas Stone
Stone is a graduate of and professor at Harvard Law School. He served for a number of years as one of the directors of the Harvard Negotiation Project, the institute that acted as the springboard and nurturing ground for multiple important sociological studies, including the one that led to this book. He is a contributing author to multiple other books, including Thanks for the Feedback: The Science and Art of Receiving Feedback Well (2014).
Bruce Patton
Patton is also a cofounder of the Harvard Negotiation Project. He has taught at Harvard Law School for over 40 years, and helped to launch the teaching of negotiation at the school when he first began his career teaching law. He is also a contributing author of the book Getting to YES: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In (1981). His specific teaching interests and expertise include the art of negotiation, dealing with conflict, and creating specific management techniques to deal with employing strategic goals.
Sheila Heen
Heen is a graduate of and professor at Harvard Law School. Heen’s writing and personal expertise have been featured in The New York Times, Harvard Business Review, National Public Radio, and the show Oprah. Heen has worked and done research in a number of different venues, from theological seminaries to the White House. She is the founder of Triad Consulting Group, which engages high-profile clientele, working to streamline their business tactics and resolve conflict in the workplace.
The Harvard Negotiation Project
The Harvard Negotiation Project was created in 1979 at Harvard University. Its goal was to brainstorm and design methods of resolving conflict and encourage healthy and efficient communication: “It stimulated the founding and is part of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, an inter-university consortium of scholars and activities with a multidisciplinary approach to the theory and practice of negotiation and conflict management” (313). It is widely considered the first and most influential center of studying the art of negotiation, and has been the birthplace of numerous books dedicated to the subject. It is primarily associated with the Harvard Law School and the Harvard Business School, and consists of the collaborative efforts of faculty, staff, and students.
